


Fight For Your Right

by daynight



Series: Telegraph Avenue [13]
Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bar/Pub, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-15
Updated: 2015-11-15
Packaged: 2018-05-01 20:11:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5219231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daynight/pseuds/daynight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's time to party once more with Easy Company Troopers! Beers, cosy couples and drunken regrets abound.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fight For Your Right

**Author's Note:**

> Not at all intended to be offensive to real men, characters completley and entirely based off TV show depictions, not reality.

Easy Company Troopers were all gathered in the studio inside Nix records, smoking cigarettes and trying to act far less nervous than they felt. They busied themselves by reviewing songs to next record, mostly keeping them selves occupied by mercilessly ridiculing each other’s recent song writing efforts. Perconte was holding court in a bright yellow t-shirt, a cigarette tucked behind his ear.

“So, Liebgott’s written this song. It’s called ‘Fuck You, You Piece Of Shit.” Liebgott nodded proudly at his self-assumed lyrical genius. He had penned this particular track during the period in which Webster went away and it had a certain nostalgic quality to it. Perconte shuffled the notes in front of him.

“The lyrics are as follows ‘Fuck you, you piece of shit. X4. I hate you. Repeated on a loop. Over a thrash metal beat”

“I like the energy, but I’m not sure we can play that.”

“Too complex?”

Nixon waltzed into the room like a lord entering his stately manor. A magazine was in his hand and his signature sunglasses were propped on his head, half hidden by dishevelled dark hair.

“The reviews are out.” He announced loudly. An uneasy silence fell over the members of Easy Company Troopers. Their juvenile freshman effort, that age-old EP had been so well received. What if they thought they were shit? What if they thought the magic was over? It wasn’t all about the critics, of course, but it would certainly be a large hit to moral if they were particularly damning. It had taken a lot to make this new record, a lot of change.

“They’re fucking fantastic.”

George Luz whooped, Malarkey sighed deeply, head in his hands but smiling and Liebgott hi-fived Perconte, drawing him into a hug.

“Thank fuck.”

“What should we do?”

“Isn’t that obvious?” An effervescent George Luz stated with his arm slung lovingly around Malarkey’s broad shoulders.

“We should have a party.”

 

* * *

 

The impromptu celebration was held on the shop floor of the record shop and extended out to the studios in the back. All their friends were in attendance, apart from Winters, who was busy at the bar, and Roe and Joe Toye, in a meeting about new menus. People were getting pretty inebriated, especially Babe, who was gulping at a 40 of Budweiser with adolescent gusto.

About an hour in to the party, at a stage that was acknowledged as far too early to be this gone, Babe clambered up onto the front desk like a drunken yet surprisingly nimble mountain goat.

“Errrryone!” He whipped off his backwards cap and waved it in the air to call the attention of the record store inhabitants, stumbling slightly. “I have an announcement to make!”

The guys all groaned in a harmonising chorus.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, here he goes.” Liebgott grumbled.

“We all know you’re in love with Doc, Babe.” Malarkey cried, cupping his hand around his mouth as an amplifier.

“Jesus Christ, it’s not even an announcement. We don’t fucking care.”

“We know you wanna get in Roe’s pants.”

“Get down, you’re embarrassing yourself.”

Babe seemed both surprised at their anti-climatic reaction, greatly relieved that Roe wasn’t there (although, they thought, Roe **had** to know or he was being deliberately obtuse) and flabbergasted by the response. He paused for a second, holding his finger up, on the cusp of a truly profound speech. Then his enlightened expression changed to more of a pained grimace.

“Actually…I think I’m gonna be sick.”

The groans turned to open cries of disgust.

“What the fuck?”

“That was even worse than what we expected!”

“Worst fucking announcement ever.”

“Get him down before he spews on us!”

Nixon, who had been watching events deteriorate with a mixture of amusement and dread, swiftly grabbed a faltering Babe by his skinny waist and hauled him off the desk and towards the bathroom.

 

* * *

 

After Babe had been absconded to the bathroom with Johhny the bouncer keeping an eye on him, the ‘adults’ resumed their partying. The next victim of the readily-flowing beer was Liebgott, who had somehow managed to end up face down on the floor, a sight so unremarkable that the other member of Easy just gingerly stepped over him, unconcerned. Leibgott has a surprising drunken fortitude for his size. Webster finally arrived, late after a class for school, eyes darting around for his erstwhile boyfriend.

“Lieb!”

Liebgott lifted his head up off the floor blearily, smiling widely and pointing finger guns at Webster with accompanying ‘pew’ sound effects.

“Hey Baby. I see you got my booty calls” A collective horrified gasp went up amongst those who were unfortunate enough to be in earshot.

“Well, I got your calls but to be honest I couldn’t really understand them so I thought I should come pick you up.” He bent down to offer Liebgott his hand.

Liebgott immediately started pawing at him, kissing the side of his face, much to the utter disgust of witnesses of this hideous, out of character display of affection. Webster was bright red but seemed weirdly pleased, despite complete embarrassment.

“Stop it, Joe.”

Liebgott started clumsily trying to rip open his shirt as Webster was trying to help him up, slurring ‘show everyone your hairy chest’, much to Webster’s weary chagrin.

“Okay, now really stop it. Come on, we’re going home.”

He dragged Liebgott out of the door. Liebgott immediately took Webster by the hand (something he very rarely did in public) and started pulling him towards a parked car.

 “Ah, my cab.”

 The few people who had gathered to witness the spectacle had begun to snicker. Joe attempted to open the door to the driving seat as Webster tried to stop him.

“Don’t let him drive Web! He’s a terrible drunk driver!”

Webster turned around from his task of trying to control his inebriated boyfriend to squint at Malarkey.

“You let him drive drunk?”

“Only when necessary.”

Unfortunately, Webster had no time to reprimand past reckless behaviour. Liebgott had now managed to shuffle onto the hood of the car. Webster sighed deeply and gestured at him to get up, which he did with surprising obedience. He turned around and slung Liebgott’s arms around his neck, then grabbed his legs and hauled him into a sloppy piggyback. He turned back to momentarily address Joe's friends, his friends now.

“Sorry about this, guys. We’ll see you tomorrow, alright?”

Liebgott had his eyes closed and his nose pressed against Webster’s neck as he began to carry him down the road, towards their shared home above the record shop.

“Don’t drool on me too much, okay.” Webster whispered.

A sleepy yawn and an open mouthed kiss on the neck.

“Okay.”

 

* * *

 

Babe was in his dorm, after having been delivered there by a very amused Nixon, who forced him inside and made him down a pint of water, then sped off to resume the festivities. He didn’t want to be in his dorm. He felt there was something very important that he should be doing instead. Somewhere out there, in a location not very far away at all, there was a man called Eugene Roe, and he was not currently being kissed. This was wrong, very wrong, and Babe decided that it needed correcting immediately.

He rose from his bunk bed and pulled on his puffy, orange jacket. It looked a bit ludicrous over a pair of shorts and sneakers, but he wasn’t trying to be stylish. He had a mission. Swaying, he left the room and ventured into the night. Stumbling out of the dorm building, he noticed a nice patch of daisy-like flowers and plucked one, smiling blithely and humming ‘Cecilia’ by Simon and Garfunkel as he made his way towards The Battalion.

Eugene was just locking up, having just said goodbye to Speirs and Lipton, who had come to pick him up with their sweet natured dog. Babe approached in a way that he had hoped was stealthy, but Gene immediately noticed. He must not have been that subtle, after all, he did almost fall down twice.

“What the hell…” He heard Gene mutter.

“Hey!” A little too sunshine bright for the middle of the night in an alley, but it would have to do. Babe was happy just being in Gene's presence, even if he was staring at him with wary confusion.

“What are you doin’ here Heffron? I thought you went to that party.” Babe was beginning to be able to catch the hint of worry behind the gruff voice, but he didn’t really know quite what it meant.

Feeling gratified and pleased that Roe had actually remembered him droning on and on about the party the night before, Babe grinned.

“I did go! But then I left! Nixon made me. And now…now I’m here!” Roe sighed heavily and kneaded his white brow.

“How much have you had to drink?”

“Not much! Jeez, sorry, dad.” Gene’s eyebrows shot up at his unexpected turn of phrase and Babe suddenly felt very embarrassed for a number of reasons, most of them weirdly sexual.

“Shit!” He continued, feeling dizzy, like the fluctuating ground was conspiring against him. “Erm, a little.”

“Right.” Very clipped.

“I came here ‘cuz I needed to tell you something.” He lurched forwards.

“What’s that?” Roe was steadying him, a hand on his shoulder, big dark eyes searching, beseeching, and Babe suddenly felt very nervous, very silly. Perhaps it was wrong to do it like this. He should be sober and sincere. Not stupid and wasted. But he must. He needed to do it now, whilst he had courage, otherwise it was going to eat him alive. It was too much. That cold, strong hand, the darkness of his hair in the harsh light of the streetlamps, his sloping, slightly pink nose. Roe’s tense arm was anchoring him to the earth as the world began to violently spin. He was too much.

 _I love you_ , he thought.

“I – “ He started and at that very moment, Babe suddenly felt his stomach flip-flop. He quickly wrenched away from Roe and proceeded to vomit in the most gruesome manner into a bush, spilling his guts quite literally for the second time that night.

 

* * *

 

It was to the sound of someone busying downstairs to which Nixon awoke, something that had become a regular occurrence since moving in with Dick, the perpetual early bird. He dragged his face away from the pillow and wiped the drool away from his mouth, carefully turning over in bed.

“Urgh.” His mouth tasted like unadulterated ass. He should really go brush his teeth before demanding a morning kiss, yet he found himself entirely unmotivated to move, especially since he could hear the tell-tale sounds of Dick marching himself up the stairs.

Dick was holding two mugs of coffee as he nudged open their bedroom door. His checked shirt was immaculately ironed. Nixon felt like he’s just crawled out of a cave. They really were opposites in almost every way.

“Morning!” Said Dick in a cheerful way. “I’ve got your joe.”

“What time is it?” Nixon groaned. Dick checked the neat watch on his wrist, a present from Nixon that made him swell with pride every time Dick happened to glance at it, glad to have gifted him with something that he found so useful.

“Pretty late. Around 9.”

“9?!?! Ughhhh!” Winters laughed and handed Nixon the coffee cup.

“Don’t complain. You said you wanted to try getting up earlier.”

“Yeah, but not at the crack of dawn.” Winters shook his head indulgently, not even bothering to argue and settled on the bed next to him, resting his hand on Nixon’s propped up knee, giving it a squeeze.

“I hope the coffee compensates.”

Nixon took a long sip and threw him a blinding grin.

“It does.”

“Good.” Winted swiped at Nixon’s knee and got up from the bed. “Get out of bed now, I’m making breakfast.”

“Alright, alright.” Dick began walking back downstairs but paused at the door with a half smile.

“Oh, by the way, Roe is very angry with you.”

“What? Why?” Nixon was used to unexpected random grudges, but from Roe? He was one of his favourite people in town, mostly due to him being the one to serve his whiskeys most nights.

“Because you let Heffron get drunk. He called me early this morning whilst you were still asleep to chastise me and asked me to pass it on. Something about you being a responsible adult.”

“Hey, I **was** responsible!” Nixon yelled indignantly, pulling the covers up under his armpits. “I got him fixed up okay, I took him back to the dorms and made sure he got in. He’s fine.”

“Well, he’s still mad. I’m not sure if he just has a soft spot for Babe or he’s just an extremely conscientious barman. It’s very hard to tell."

“Hmph. I tried my best, I’ll have you know.”

“I know, I’ve checked up on him and he’s fine. I’m proud of you.” Nixon propped his coffee cup on the bedside table, threw back the covers dramatically and clambered out of bed, over to Winters. He kissed him on the cheek with his rough stubble and tapped him lightly on the ass as he shuffled past him.

“Thanks sweetie. Beat you down for breakfast?”

 

* * *

 

 

“Babe.”

Babe opened one eye and almost jumped out of his skin to see Eugene Roe looking at him quizzically, eye-level, his pallid face almost completely taking up Babe’s field of vision. Normally, Babe would consider this situation to be kind of heavenly, and for 0.3 seconds he almost reached out to touch his cheek, but without being provided with any memory or context as to how it came to be, all he could manage emotionally was confusion.

“Shit!” He struggled upwards; feeling a sharp pain arch through his skull. Wincing and trying to open both eyes, he attempted to gain composure. He realised that he had been carefully wrapped in a light blue duvet. He was on a bed, one that smelt distinctly like whiskey, antiseptic and the kind of spiced incense that they used to use at mass in the Cathedral back in Philadelphia.

‘You okay?” Gene’s voice was gentle, too gentle. Babe closed his eyes again, blinked hard to make sure he wasn’t dreaming.

“Yeah I guess…” He gingerly pressed long fingers against his tender forehead and glanced around the entirely unfamiliar, pale coloured room, with two hanging baskets of dark green plants near the window and nothing but a clock up on the wall. A white desk and bookcase stood in the corner, filled up with medical textbooks and Rimbaud and Sartre, un-translated. Gene was crouching next to him, close enough to touch, looking concerned. “Where am I?”

“My bedroom.” Of course it was. No wonder the pillow smelt so fucking good. He should have spent longer inhaling. _Shit_. Why was he here? Babe couldn’t remember. He hated that.

“How –“

“I found you outside The Batallion. You said you’d been taken home but you had come out again. You weren’t really in a good condition so I took you here.” Gene bounced a little on his feet. _Cute._ He then wiped his hands on his thighs and straightened up, offering a hand to Babe.

“Coffee?”

“Yeah.” Replied Babe, in a wobbly voice, reluctantly taking Gene’s hand. It was cold, like always, and was dropped away far too soon. Babe, rumpled in his garish, slept-in clothes was thrown into stark comparison to a freshly showered (oh god) Gene, in a thin shirt and grey sweats, who seemed to shine like a light in front of him. He followed him drowsily through a bare corridor to a kitchen/living room with a wooden floor and a big white couch that was dressed with sheets and a dented pillow. Gene had slept here, and let Babe sleep on the bed. _Jesus_. Filing this discovery away into his mental ‘obsess over this later for hours’ section, Babe padded over to a small table, sitting obediently where Gene gestured.

Whilst Gene busied himself with a coffee pot in the kitchen, Babe scanned the area. Big couch, stripy rug, small TV, little table. Clean and neat. Not much else. Just as modest and subdued as he would have expected, so strange in comparison to Babe’s near chaotic dorm room, a cacophony of skateboards and gig posters, road signs procured with a giggling group of friends, instruments, DJ equipment and colourful little trinkets that he found in random places and decided to adopt. He loved it. It was easy to be peaceful here.

In the midst of his reverie, Eugene set a mug down in front of him. He looked up to see a smile and felt his face grow warm as his usual shyness around the man returned with his daytime consciousness.

“Drink up.” Gene said, roughly, in that thick accent that Babe loved. He seemed so much more at ease here, more relaxed, lighter. It made Babe’s heart ache. He picked up the mug and gulped it down, immediately feeling better.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.” Eugene shrugged, leaning against the kitchen counter.

“I’m sorry for being so much trouble.”

“You ‘aint.” Was the only response he got.

“Did I uh…did I say anything weird last night? I was really…drunk.”

“No shit.” Gene snorted and Babe marvelled at the change in his features when he laughed and felt bright, even if he was laughing at him, not with him. “Nah.” He continued. “You sang a lot, though.”

“Fuck!”

“I didn’t know anyone could like the Beastie Boys that much.”

Babe laughed self-consciously and scratched the back of his head.

“They’re pretty good…” He genuinely loved them.

Gene just raised his eyebrows knowingly and Babe had horrible visions of rapping their entire repertoire as Roe dragged him home that felt a bit like flashbacks. Was he right in remembering that Gene knew most of 'Sabotage' and joined in? Surely not.

“Thanks.” Babe mumbled. “For gettin’ me here. I mean, I’m such an idiot -“

“Nah.” Said Gene, cutting him off sharply. He reached out to grab the handle of Babe’s finished coffee cup just as Babe reached to give it to him. Their hands grazed and Babe felt Gene freeze, sudden and shocking, like he had been electrocuted. In a flash, he quickly drew his hand away, cementing a wall between them once more.

 

* * *

 

Webster awoke to a familiar warbling. The warbling was emanating from the shower. He opened his eyes and climbed out of bed silently, plucking his boxers from the headboard and locating the rest of the clothes from around the room (how did his shirt end up halfway out of the window?). He slowly pulled them on and, smiling at his prank, snuck out to the bathroom.

“I’m every woman, it’s all in meeeeeeeeee.” Webster crept over and straightened up, clearing his voice.

“Jesus Christ” He exclaimed, standing just outside the shower. Webster heard Leibgott jump within the shower, knocking down Webster’s own fancy organics shampoo and conditioner. Laughing, he drew back the shower curtain.

“What the fuck!” Shouted an irate Liebgott, his hair up in a suddy, frothy quiff.

“Nice song.” Webster smirked.

“It’s been stuck in my head for ages.” Sneered Liebgott, not quite pulling off his normally intimidating glare with a head crowned by bubbles. “Fuck off. I’m showerin’ here.” He flicked a fully dressed Webster with water, right in the face.

“Hey!”

Sniggering at how the tables had turned, Liebgott started splashing Webster heavily as he tried to shield himself. Soon, Webster started laughing as well. He rolled his eyes and pulled off his shirt, then his boxers and jeans and climbed in to join him, pushing and jostling each other, grinning. He might as well. He was already wet, after all.

 

* * *

 

Back in his messy dorm, nursing a nightmarish headache and after having to endure many catcalls from his friends, mistakenly assuming that his miserable trudge back through the student dorms was a successful walk of shame, Babe felt less than brilliant. He was smarting terribly from the freaked out way that Gene had reacted to his touch, for acting like such an idiot and burdening him, for being too drunk or hung-over to appreciate the trust that a supremely private Gene had shown him by allowing him to be inside his house and sleep in his bed.

Then, a saving grace, a silver lining. He remembered. Just as he woke up, Gene had called him Babe, hadn't he?

 

**Author's Note:**

> I've been on a beastie boys kick!  
> Song from title is from [this tune](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBShN8qT4lk) \- tbh this is how i imagine most of the boys dressing, especially Babe. He's on that 80's/90's ting, for sure. I bet he has a beastie-boys decal on his skateboard along with like, spongebob squarepants.
> 
> Also, telegraph avenue only has 1 chapter left! wahayyyy


End file.
